


as now I live

by taynicola



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Post-The Raven King, and about noah, but it's not a romance fic, it's about the gangsey, okay so TECHNICALLY this has pynch and bluesey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-29
Updated: 2016-06-29
Packaged: 2018-07-18 22:17:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7332868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taynicola/pseuds/taynicola
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How does Henrietta remember the boy that gave everything?</p>
            </blockquote>





	as now I live

**Author's Note:**

> I posted this [here](http://hhermes.tumblr.com/post/144955301486/remembered) on tumblr awhile back, and now I just want to bring it over.
> 
> title from the poem ["To Memory"](http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-memory/) by Mary Elizabeth Coleridge

It starts when it ends, with a rainy April day and two boys dying on the ley line. Time forfeits its linear path and one boy dies once, again, for the last time, to save the other. “Don’t throw it away,” he says once, again, for the last time, but no one hears him, and they don’t remember.

\--- 

It starts when a group of friends travel around the world together. In Delhi, when every surface is covered in bright, colorful powder and there’s sound and celebration in every corner, the girl feels a twinge in her heart. She thinks, perhaps, she knows someone who would love this, or she once did. But then a hand pulls her into the crowd, and she smiles. She doesn’t remember.

\--- 

It starts when a boy returns home from visiting his boyfriend, and he sees his quiet home, his quiet car, and his not so quiet daughter. He feels a flash of loneliness. He craves someone’s company. He assumes it’s his boyfriends, but there’s a piece of him that isn’t so sure. A piece of him that misses a wry, smudged smile and an affinity for recklessness. But the yearning is small, and easily pushed down, assumed as folly. He doesn’t remember.

\--- 

It starts after 4 years, at a boy’s graduation. It’s the first time they’re all reunited, and they congratulate him. The boy holds his chin high: he’s earned this. His boyfriend stands next to him, glowing with pride. The five of them stand in a circle, facing each other. They leave a spot for a sixth. It’s a gap between them that no one notices or comments on. There’s just a space, and a subconscious wondering of when it will be (was?) filled. They don’t remember.

It starts later that night, when the boy introduces them to his friends. They stay up into the late hours, because there aren’t any exams or planes in the morning, and they can. Drinks are truths are spilled. Someone asks the girl who her first kiss was. She glances at her ink-stained boyfriend, flashing a slightly embarrassed smile. “Well, he was–” she starts, and then stops. She’s looking at him, and he’s looking at her, and they’re both expecting the same story, of rain and sacrifice and the life of a forest.

But she stops, because she remembers. She says his name, and a spell breaks. Her friends laugh and tease her. The words “if” and “ley line” are tossed around, as all of them momentarily miss their friend. But she is still. She feels like a floodgate has been opened in her memory, and she’s overwhelmed. It’s not that she’d forgotten, it’s that her mind had never devoted time to remembering, and now she wishes it had. But as the conversation moves on to other things, she can already feel her mind closing again. She wails, willing it to stay open, but it does not. And soon she forgets, both about the boy and her own acute sadness.

\--- 

It starts when a boy, who has finally conquered much of his insomnia, has a dream, and a voice speaks.

It says, “Someone else on the ley line is dying.”

It says “You will live.”

He’s heard these words in his dreams countless times, but something is different. The voice is different, somehow. This time, it says, “Don’t throw it away.”

The boy wakes. He doesn’t jolt up in bed, he doesn’t thrash around. His eyes simply open, and he remembers.

But then, in the way of dreams, he forgets. He goes back to bed.

\--- 

It starts in a big house filled with women. On the ground floor, a tarot reading is being done. The women point out various cards with fondness. The Page of Cups. The Magician and the Hermit. Death. In the corner of the reading sits the Hanged Man. The women see the card, and speak only of choice and hard decisions. They say nothing of a sacrifice made years ago. They do not remember, and apparently neither do the cards.

\--- 

I starts when they are lounging in a big house on a small farm in a small town. The radio is playing.

Then, two things happen at once. A song comes on, and the girl returns from the kitchen with a bottle of liquor.

The song has a strong guitar riff, and slightly nasally harmonies. The bottle is tall and frosted.

The song is by blink-182 and the bottle is peach schnapps.

They all look at each other, and all at once, they remember.

\--- 

It ends on a cool April day, 7 years after it started. They stand around, once more in a circle, once more leaving space for an extra, but this time they know why.

They are all haunted, cursed by the knowledge that they forgot for so long. They see forgiveness in each other’s eyes, but feel only shame. They feel only loss.

A boy opens his mouth. He tells a story, about falling out windows and rude gestures.

Then the girl opens her mouth. She tells a story about snow globes and swirling glitter.

Together, they tell stories.

It feels like a disservice after 7 years of forgetting, but together they tell stories and remember.

They tell stories about the boy who loved music and bright things. They tell stories about the boy who was adventurous and afraid. They tell stories about the boy who was slight, small, and smudged, but also powerful. Together, they remember.

They make a pact to reunite every year, and remember.

They curse and forgive themselves for forgetting, and vow to remember.

At various points, they all think they hear a whisper. A voice at the edge of their hearing that they may be imagining. It says, “Goodbye.”

Once, again, and not for the last time, they remember.


End file.
